Between 1993 and 1997, juvenile arrests for murder have declined 39 percent, and the juvenile arrest rate for weapons law violations has dropped 23 percent. Yet despite such downturns, law enforcement agencies still made 2.8 million arrests of persons under age 18 in 1997.

Indeed, the number of juvenile arrests is straining the Nation's justice system beyond capacity, and nowhere is this more evident than detention. By 1996, 320,900 delinquency cases involved detention, 87,200 of which involved person offenses. One result has been crowding in juvenile detention facilities. The 1995 Children in Custody census revealed that half of all public juvenile detention centers were operating above their design capacity. This impacts the juvenile justice system's ability to provide for the safety of juveniles in custody and the public and to use detention as an opportunity to identify and respond to the short-term needs of juvenile offenders.

Diverting appropriate youthful offenders from detention can pay dividends for youth who are not a danger to themselves and for those remaining in detention. Detention Diversion Advocacy: An Evaluation shows how one program has benefited from a carefully designed and implemented diversion strategy.

Shay Bilchik
Administrator

Points of view or opinions expressed in this document are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the official position or policies of OJJDP or the U.S. Department of Justice.

The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention is a component of the Office of Justice Programs, which also includes the Bureau of Justice Assistance, the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the National Institute of Justice, and the Office for Victims of Crime.